Andrew Goodman was a young man from New York who went to Mississippi during the summer of 1964 to participate in the civil rights struggles that were taking place then in the South. Shortly after he arrived he vanished. Andrew and two other civil rights workers had been taken by members of the Ku Klux Klan and brutally murdered. Their bodies were found some time later.
Andrew's mother Carolyn Goodman wrote a memoir about her long life and her experience of those dark days when her son was so cruelly taken away from her. Her book, "My Mantelpiece - a Memoir of Survival and Social Justice," was just published posthumously to mark the 50th anniversary of Andrew's death during the summer of 1964, that Freedom Summer.
Carolyn Goodman lived for almost a century. Her memoir is filled with compelling insights. And while there's a poignancy to her recollections this is not about nostalgia. Carolyn Goodman lived her life with great purpose and determination. She died in 2007.
In this interview her youngest son David Goodman shared some of his memories of his mother and of his brother Andrew. He explained how this book came to be written and the publication process. David Goodman is a graduate of Antioch College, he took a moment during our conversation to describe how the education he received here has provided him with unique opportunities to succeed in his chosen profession of engineering.
